The dog days are over (because the cat's out now too)
by coalitiongirl
Summary: "I am naked in our bed and there's a dog at the foot of it. How did he get in here?" A beat. "Emma. How did he get in here."


It's not adoption as much as it's Regina coming home from work one day and discovering a pit bull mix in her living room. Emma claims it was just sitting outside the sheriff's station and she's decided to train it for the good of the town and Regina sweetly suggests that she move back in with her parents.

"It's just a puppy! You can't send a puppy out into the cold!"

"It's bigger than Henry. It's not a puppy."

Emma points out that she'd kept horses and this dog is roughly the size of a newborn colt. Which. Not convincing. She doesn't want it anywhere near her. Or her couch. Or her coffee table. Or her _bed_.

"See, he climbed up the stairs! That's progress, you have to tell him he's a good boy."

"I am naked in our bed and there's a dog at the foot of it. How did he get in here?" A beat. "_Emma_. _How _did he _get_ in _here_."

The new concession is that they put up a child gate at the bottom of the stairs and the mongrel isn't allowed up it. Except into Henry's room because Henry begs and begs and Emma pouts and holds up the dog's chin so they have matching faces pleading with her. She ignores the beast and only takes it for walks because Emma is a monster before six AM and someone has to do it.

"Archie told me that he saw you playing catch with the puppy in the park this morning."

"Archie is telling you bald-faced lies."

"I think you like the little guy more than you let on."

She calls David and threatens his wife and newborn child if he doesn't get the dog out of her house. Destroying people's happiness doesn't seem to be a very effective motivator anymore, though, and when she gets home that evening he's bounding around with Emma and the mongrel in the backyard and the puppy jumps on her and licks her face and whines until she sighs and throws the frisbee.

Just once. Maybe twice. Never again.

Then there's the kitten Henry finds curled under the porch one afternoon, mewling for its mother. It's black with a little white patch on its face and she doesn't even look up when she hears the meow, just orders Henry back outside. And Emma nods gravely and agrees that another pet is a bad, bad idea because the puppy is enough and would hate the kitten, but then she hears the can opener and hushed voices and she comes out of her office to discover Emma and Henry feeding tuna fish to the kitten on the porch.

"If you feed her, she's never going to leave!"

Impossibly widened eyes. "Oh no, do you think so?"

"You're _impossible_."

The kitten doesn't leave, and two days later she leaves for a walk with the puppy in the morning and comes back to find the kitten seated on her bed, pawing at Emma's face while she sleeps. Emma swears she hadn't let it in, and Regina sighs and takes the blame and tries to take it outside again but it stares at her with cool green eyes as though asking, _Who do you think you are _and Emma pats it on the back and grins at her.

"Henry's going to be so happy."

"Your son is not finding out about this…creature being indoors!"

He finds out. And then there are trips to the vet and names being selected and Regina didn't ask for any of this, she'd just wanted some vengeance on her enemies and absolute reign over a sleepy town in Maine. Now she doesn't even get a say in what time they have dinner because the puppy thinks that the oven dinging is a toy and then Henry and Emma have to take him out to play. And the kitten sits on the porch with Regina and watches with distaste when Emma tackles the puppy and they both roll around on the floor, one barking and one laughing and Regina isn't smiling, it's a grimace.

"I was grimacing."

"You were not. You loooove us."

"I love _you_. Eat your cauliflower.

…I can see you dropping it on the floor, Emma."

The kitten and the puppy don't get along at all at first. The puppy is too excited and their kitten is a real Mills kitten, tough as nails and hissing and attacking him in the face. It gets so bad that they talk about keeping the kitten upstairs and putting the baby gate back up but then one day they come home together and find the kitten curled up inside that big dumb puppy's legs. And then suddenly the kitten is marching around the house and the puppy bounds after it and somehow they're tolerating each other even if the kitten still hisses and claws sometimes and the puppy bares his teeth and growls back and then they're back together on the couch in the evening, fast asleep sprawled over each other.

"Hey, don't they kind of remind you of–"

"_No_, Miss Swan. Now come back to bed."


End file.
